Thursday, February 23, 2012

Officer Safety Uber Alles: The Coercion Cartel's Prime Directive

The Minnesota state legislature
is debating a measure that would amplify that state’s “Castle Doctrine” by
recognizing that innocent people have no “duty to retreat” in the face of
criminal aggression.

This would expand existing legal protection for the defensive use of
lethal force against home
invaders -- including, where appropriate, the government-employed variety. That prospect is causing the local tax eaters’ guild to irrigate
their skivvies.

Dennis Flaherty, executive
director of the Minnesota Police and Peace Officers Association, complains that
enactment of the measure “could result in dangerous situations for police
officers, who regularly enter homes without permission,” reports Twin Cities ABC
affiliate KSTP. “We’re fearful that people will react and shoot and our
officers could be mistaken for someone that they believe is trying to
jeopardize their safety,” simpers Flaherty. In encounters of the kind
Flaherty describes, it would be more accurate to say that citizens would recognize police officers as people who “jeopardize
their safety.”

In an
interview with Minnesota Public Radio, Flaherty stated the matter even more
candidly: “Officer
safety is the primary concern that we have about this bill…. [E]very day in
the state of Minnesota, we have peace officers that are entering on somebody’s
property – often times by stealth so that we have the element of surprise. We
are extremely fearful that with this shoot-first-ask-questions-later mentality
that this bill establishes, that we will have officers that will not only be in
harm’s way, but in fact will be injured or perhaps killed.”

The tacit subtext of Flaherty’s complaint is the assumption that in every
encounter between citizens and police, officer safety is the paramount concern,
and citizen safety is of negligible importance. This is why, in the
words of the Rochester Post-Bulletin,
“prosecutors, police chiefs and sheriffs across the state are lining up” to
oppose the measure.

When intruders seek to enter a
home without permission, observed the Post-Bulletin,
“those on the other side of the door don’t always know that it’s a police
officer who is entering their residence. They might have been asleep, awakening
only when they hear the sounds of a door being kicked in or footsteps on the
stairs. Their judgment and awareness might be impaired by drugs, alcohol,
mental illness or the belief that an abusive ex-boyfriend or rival gang members
many have arrived with bad intentions.”

Minneapolis SWAT operator gets a medal for raiding the wrong house.

A likelier scenario involves the
even deadlier possibility that the door has been forced open by state-licensed
marauders who can kill anyone within the dwelling with impunity.

So the
appropriate remedy would be to abolish paramilitary police raids, correct? Not
according to the Post-Bulletin’s
editorial collective: “We’re with the law enforcement officers on this one….
This [expanded Castle Act] would give people the impression that when their
front doorknob is rattled in the middle of the night, they have free license to
shoot first and ask questions later. That’s not a good thing.”

A license of that kind is “not a good thing” – for
anyone other than fully accredited members of the state’s punitive priesthood,
of course. Whenever one of the Regime’s costumed enforcers kills a mere
Mundane, he can usually avoid criminal prosecution simply by claiming that he “felt
threatened” by something – a furtive gesture, a momentary refusal to cooperate,
a dirty look, or something else detectable only through the mystical
mind-reading facility that comes with a “peace officer” license and a piece of
government-issued costume jewelry.

Critics of the Castle
Doctrine bill complain that it is unnecessary, since Minnesota state statutes
already recognize that a homeowner defending his property against invaders –
other than the government-employed variety – has no duty to retreat. The bill
would expand legal recognition of that right to include any circumstance in
which an individual’s life is threatened – and this, according to critics,
would have disastrous consequences.

“There are just way too many
situations that could potentially escalate to the point of using deadly force
[in public] where if someone would just walk away, the deadly force could have
been avoided,” complains
Fergus Falls Police Chief Kile Bergen. “That’s our job; we’re supposed to
go in and apprehend these people. You as a citizen, that’s not your
responsibility. It might be to protect yourself, but it’s not your job to rid
the world of dangerous people.”

Chief Bergen is particularly
offended by the fact that the bill would establish a “reasonable individual”
test for the use of deadly force. Although Bergen whines that this would give
citizens “more authority than a police officer has to use deadly force,” that
provision would actually apply a standard similar to as the “reasonable
officer” test. The measure also criminalizes the act of disarming
citizens unless this is done pursuant to a lawful arrest -- just as the state’s “resisting
and obstructing” statute can be used to prosecute a citizen who disarms a
police officer.

If Chief Bergen actually thinks
his job has something to do with “rid[ding] the world of dangerous
people,” he’s not only unqualified to be a peace officer, he’s a tragically
deluded soul who should be kept away from sharp objects. More telling still is
his perception that everyday life is cluttered with
situations pregnant with potential gunplay.

That’s how police are trained to
perceive the world: They see the public as an undifferentiated mass of menace,
an all-encompassing threat to that most important of all human considerations, “officer
safety.” This is why they are prepared to employ potentially lethal force at
the first sign of non-cooperation, and escalate the encounter until the Mundane
either submits or is killed. They are prepared to shoot first in the serene
confidence that the questions asked later will be intended to exonerate the
officer.

Bergen’s objections – which are
quite representative of the police union’s opposition to enhanced Castle Doctrine protections – assume that
citizens who take responsibility for protecting themselves will start thinking
and behaving like cops. No, this isn’t quite accurate: Even in the most extravagant
worst-case scenario, the expanded Castle Law wouldn’t be taken as a general
license for citizens to conduct home invasion raids, like the December 2007
police assault on the home of Minneapolis resident Vang Khang.

It was after midnight when Khang’s wife, Yee
Moua, heard the sound of a window shattering, followed by the quiet murmur
of male voices. She frantically dialed 911 to summon the police. When the
intruders came upstairs, Vang fired a shotgun at them, provoking a brief burst
of return fire. Thankfully, nobody was injured, although some of the officers
reported trivial shrapnel damage to their body armor.

It was after the exchange of
gunfire that the couple learned the invaders were the local SWAT team, which
had been sent to the wrong address.

According
to Police Chief Tim Dolan, “the officers didn’t make any mistakes.” This would mean that they intended to raid the wrong house and expose innocent children to gunfire. Apparently, that’s the stuff of
which contemporary heroism is made.

"The easy decision would
have been to retreat under covering fire,” Dolan declared. “The team did not
take the easy way out. This is a perfect example of a situation that could have
gone horribly wrong, but did not because of the professionalism with which it
was handled."

Note how Dolan conferred the commendations on the SWAT team for refusing to retreat when the situation demanded that they do so. It was their refusal to "walk away" that Dolan considered a praiseworthy display of professionalism.

How often do employees of
privately owned businesses receive professional commendations after completely
messing up? Are awards of that sort routinely handed out to private employees
whose incompetence endangers innocent lives, and results in extensive damage to
private property?

More to the point: Would a private security company hand out bonuses and promotions to employees who terrorized an innocent family and perforated their home with automatic weapons fire? Of course not: Only employees of the State’s coercion cartel
are permitted to behave that way.

Chief Dolan, not surprisingly, opposes
the “Castle Doctrine.” This is because “lessening the burden” on citizens who
confront intruders would mean they might be “more willing to take shots at the
people who are behind that door” – just as Vang Khang did the night Dolan’s
stormtroopers invaded his home without a warrant or just cause.

The Castle Doctrine “isn’t good
for public safety,” insists Dolan, who – like most of those in his profession –
appears to believe that the police are the only part of the population worth protecting.

Obiter dicta

On February 19, I had the singular honor to introduce Dr. Ron Paul at a campaign event in Boise:

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Electric introduction. Again I wish I'd been there but Mr. Anonymous made it appear, though unintended, that it was YOU, Will, who was getting a beat down, for whatever reason, and not that you were giving such an eloquent intro for Paul. Sadly, well... actually not, I am not a Republican and haven't been one for over ten years, but I wonder if there are open caucuses. I'll need to investigate further.

I saw the apparent ambiguity there too when I was writing that comment, but then I realized that the notion of Will Grigg being on the receiving end of a beat down of any description is as self-contradictory as the notion of a rectangular triangle.

I live in Rochester, and I personally know a lot of cops that are happy this bill is finally going somewhere. Many police are glad to see that castle doctrine, and stand-your-ground laws are passing here, just as I know many that were happy for concealed carry laws.

I am unsure of the numbers, so I cannot say for sure if they are in the minority or not.

Bank bailouts are an example of rewarding failure so the passing out of medals was no surprise. Stopping the paramilitary raids is the correct answer but it makes too much sense in an idiocracy. DARE-to keep cops off donuts. P.S. I laugh at republican hypocrisy regarding Ron Paul calling him a moonbat and his supporters Paultards. They say anyone but obama out of one side of their mouth then mock the only candidate with any morals or common sense ideas out of the other side.

Awesome intro Mr. Grigg.Dr. Paul is coming to our town of Fairbanks Alaska this Sunday, I was wondering if you would come on our local radio show this saturday and talk to us about Ron Paul.If so, please email me at bighorn.alaska@gmail.com